


flood my airways until i forget to breathe

by stickynote_chan



Series: music threads her heart close [6]
Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/F, F/M, Hurt No Comfort, M/M, Multi, Syren salt, THIS IS SALTY, lukanette is very smol, ml salt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-22
Updated: 2020-02-01
Packaged: 2020-10-26 04:14:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,844
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20736062
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stickynote_chan/pseuds/stickynote_chan
Summary: There’s something building in the back of her throat and it’s a bitter foreignness because Chat Noir and Ladybug are supposed to be soulmates. They’repartners. Two curves of the same circle, designed by the ultimate pair of Kwamis. They should fit into each other palms like the perfect set as something, sometimes, beyond human and matched in that inhumanity.It’s not fair but it’s spirit-bound. It’s not fair because it’s spirit-bound. There’s nothing inherently equitable about the situation because the spirits don’t care about human fairness, they only divine for their view of balance.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> should read the rest of this series to understand where all Marinette's angsty spirit and inhumanity fears are coming from and also Adrien backstory

The next time the Lucky Charm throws a pot into her hands, Ladybug blinks, wavers and purses her lips tighter.

But she understands and there is little in trying to shake off what she is being told.

“I thought it was a one-time,” she says, tapping anxiously on her thigh. Because this is an emergency, this is responsibility, this is a cursed gift she has to make her friends swallow whole. Choke it down their throat with her own bare hands.

“It can be,” Master Fu says, eyes glinting even as he smiles.

The other Miraculous shimmers in the light but she knows there is no one else for the job. She reaches for the Fox and continues to reach for it the next three times.

She doesn’t pray, the only ones who could answer are the ones who are forcing her hands. So she begs instead. For mercy, for Alya to remain as she is. At least as much as she can with the weight of a Miraculous.

* * *

Chat Noir becomes a problem by the third time.

Ladybug doesn't realise this, doesn't recognise the crumbling as it starts. She's consumed by Alya and new problems and new issues for her mind to handle that she neglects her other duties and friends. It's her first mistake.

Even though Alya still smiles, is still mostly fine, is never begrudged with being a Miraculous Holder, Ladybug is constantly swallowed whole with a pulsating anxiety about her best friend and Kwami and cuts in Chat Noir and Rena Rouge's strange one-sided flirting dance with decisiveness, “We should head back; Rena's about to transform.”

“So you're allowed to know her true identity, but I'm not?” Chat Noir pouts and moans and it’s normal, he can go on and on about some of the most inane things and usually Ladybug will join in or keep quiet and listen but, this time, underneath his words, there’s a bitter edge she’s jarred to see.

This isn’t the first time. He’s already made several comments about secrets and Ladybug the second time Rena appeared and she’s always tried to reassure him that it wasn’t because she doesn’t trust him, it’s just not only _ her _ secret to share. Hadn’t… Hadn’t he accepted it?

“Because I have to get her Miraculous back, you know this,” she says and frowns, the pit of her stomach gnawing with more than anxiety now.

“So what's my role, then?” he almost hisses out, animalistic in this eerie version. Accusations one after the other, eyes narrowed into lightning green, shaking off any pretense of lightheartedness, “I’m the guy who's always left in the dark, huh? What else are you hiding from me?”

There’s something building in the back of her throat and it’s a bitter foreignness because Chat Noir and Ladybug are supposed to be soulmates. They’re _ partners _. Two curves of the same circle, designed by the ultimate pair of Kwamis. They should fit into each other palms like the perfect set as something, sometimes, beyond human and matched in that inhumanity.

It’s not fair but it’s spirit-bound. It’s not fair _ because _ it’s spirit-bound. There’s nothing inherently equitable about the situation because the spirits don’t _ care _ about human fairness, they only divine for their view of _ balance _.

She’d thought he’d already known.

Isn’t this the reason why he doesn’t complain about his lack of participation in Akuma balancing? She has two super moves while he only has one; she has a weird lucky charm he has to go along with even when it’s crazy; she’s the only one who can purify while he has to sit back and _ trust _ her to be good, to be perfect. He _ has _ to rely on her to finish off the Akuma, no choice, no input, only blind faith. It’s a horrible deal for him because he can _ only _ set her up for success and, yet, he himself has no chances to completely right the situation.

It’s not fair for either of them but it’s why she has to shoulder her role, has to take up the mantle of being as perfect as Ladybug can, knowing there’s so many on the line if she falls. It’s why she enjoys his jokes and his fun as much as she can.

It’s what the both of them have to make do with because the Spirits, the Kwamis, don’t care as long as it works.

Doesn’t he get that?

“This isn’t a negligent game, Chat Noir,” she says, a bite in her words she hadn’t anticipated; harsh as ruined sandpaper and she wants to take it back because they’re _ partners _ but they’re already out and slapped in his face; bright red and black. There's words spilling out before she can stop it. “It’s not a matter of small consequences, it’s the knowledge of the _ Miraculous_. Knowledge hidden is hidden for a reason, not some ploy to undermine you. This isn’t only my secret to share.”

Chat Noir opens his mouth, an angry twist to his lips and his eyes are filled with rebellion Ladybug already sees as a long and spiteful argument but Rena Rouge’s Miraculous flashes and she points at it. Feebly, as the tension between the two of them skyrockets, she says, “We, uh, really got to jam, Ladybug.”

“Yeah, sorry, Rena,” Ladybug says, feeling horribly relieved, and swings yo-yos out. “We can talk later, Chat Noir.”

Not waiting for his reply, she quickly shoots off but not quickly enough. Quietly, from behind her and only through her enhanced hearing does she hear his muttered, “I hate secrets”, and is filled with dread.

* * *

“Now come and tell me what's bothering you, Marinette.”

She bites her lip and taps her taps her fingers along her thigh. “Chat Noir is asking more and more questions. He's doesn’t like the fact that I have knowledge of you and the other Miraculouses.”

“Indeed,” Master Fu says after a lengthy pause as he messes around with his potion. “After all, he is a young boy and no one, especially this demographic, likes things being kept from them.”

“But this is a matter of the Kwami’s, it’s not a little secret with no consequences,” she says, heart racing with indignity. “I didn’t even know until there were dire and Tikki deemed me as worthy enough to know your role as the Guardian. This is responsibility and the importance of lives on the line.”

“Do you suppose he’d thought about this?”

She clenches her fists together and burns her tongue when she says, “I’d thought he’d already known and understood as the holder of the Cat Miraculous, as the other half to my whole, as my _ partner_. But no, I will not make excuses for him, not with so much on the line. He should _ know _ that this is the matter of the Miraculous. He _ should _ understand. He said he had the first time. Truth always comes at a price and he has not given his due.”

“Is that so,” Master Fu says and hums. “Well with his reactions, it has become clear he has not even come close to comprehending the responsibilities of the situation. But, well, I suppose he just doesn’t decipher the situation as much as one would want to expect. Such is the pity.”

Marinette looks at him with sharp, critical eyes and wonders why those words strings ice chips into her being.

* * *

The potion cauldron is a stark difference to the tea pot and she’s almost bursting with jubilant relief. She doesn’t have to sacrifice another friend. She grins and says, “I'll be right back!”

She prepares to leap, arm slinging back to throw the yo-yo in a familiar arc but Chat Noir grabs her wrist in an almost bruising lock. She staggers just the tiniest bit as she whips around to look at him.

Just beyond him, in the background, and entirely the focus of her eyes, the city and probably the whole of the Île-de-France province submerges itself into an almost endless ocean. She can hear people screaming.

“Wait!” he says, as if there aren’t lives one the line, as if the Akuma could_ wait _. As if every second was a game they could restart from. “Where are you going?”

“How many times do I have to tell you, Chat? I _ can't tell _ you,” she says and purses her lips, trying to shake off his hold. She breathes in through her nose and tries to gentle herself. This is her friend. Someone she has fought alongside since the beginning. “If your Kwami hasn’t deemed you ready, it is not my place either. This isn’t just my decision and you have to accept that.”

_ Or else _ , she doesn’t say and the thought is a jump scare to her own mind, unbidden and coming out of no where. They'd just argue and have a talk and agree to disagree, won't they?_ Or else _what_? _

But he doesn’t budge, doesn’t let go of both her arm and his stance. He turns his eyes of grievances to her and she is filled with a simmering anger but, even more so, an underlying guilt. This isn't fair, they both know. “But we’re a team, aren't we? We’re supposed to trust each other and I'm tired of all these secrets.”

As the sound of water continues to build, she buries her guilt and finally rips her arm out of his hold. “First, our whole partnership has been founded on trust on conditional information; we still have secret identities, for miracle’s sake! Second, this _ isn’t _ the time, Chat Noir. We have people to rescue and an Akuma to defeat. After this, we can talk later. _ Please._" She begs because there's something building up in the back of her head and it's forebodding, "Please, think of your duties and restructure your priorities. You're Chat Noir, Paris' superhero.”

* * *

Aqua-Ladybug is… interesting.

She only realises her hair is tip-dyed when she dives in and her hair floats around her in light purple-tipped tentacles. It brings forth an interesting idea but for later and it’s one she has to consult with Juleka and Luka, if only for their expertise.

There’s a bit of fumbling with swimming and rescuing people trapped underwater but she eventually gets used to it and it turns out amazing, almost fantastical if it wasn’t such a horrible situation. She’s diving and swimming like a mermaid with two legs and it’s all her childhood fantasies turned into a German fairytale as she swims and dives through flooded buildings and trapped interiors in search of the scared and trapped. At least, she can go to and from the surface to underwater places quickly, almost quicker than yo-yoing, and so many potential victims are now safe in the emergency floats or on top of buildings and high ground.

People are safe.

The Liberty is collecting everyone and it’s a relief when she can already see half her classmates on it.

“Ladybug, please, have you seen Marinette?” Luka calls out for her as she’s loading people onto the deck and it’s almost deja vu. “She got separated from Alya and her friends at the movies.”

“It’s alright,” she says and smiles. “I got her to another boat.”

“Thank goodness,” he says, eyes flicking to the horizon as if he could spot Marinette before turning back to her with a crinkled smile. “Thank you for your service, Ladybug.”

* * *

The thing is, she doesn’t realise how bad a situation it could become until it’s too late.

Between rescuing everyone she can, she’s still steadily making her way back to Chat Noir with the potion in hand. She’s climbed onto the building she’s left him at and making her way behind the chimney wall, about to come around the corner, when she sees a flash of green light and hears him yell like a child and so unlike the superhero he is.

“This is so _ dumb _! Claws in!”

She skids, scuba feet not making a sound as she scrambles and quickly whips right back from the edge and breathes a sigh of relief. She collapses against the bricks with a sigh.

What is the idiot doing?!

There’s an unfamiliar voice but there should only be on other being there so she knows from the groan alone that it’s the Kwami of Destruction talking. “What's taking her so long? Whoa, easy! W-What are you doing?!

It’s Chat Noir’s voice but an unfamiliar petulant tone, “If you don't tell me what Ladybug is hiding from me," there's a minuscule pause, a breath from the world before, "I'm-I’m done! I’m done, Plagg.”

_crack_

“You can't do that!” Plagg says but Ladybug can’t really process his words as time stops, silence chokes her head and she rears back.

There’s shattering and it feels like the world collapsing, the stitches of everything untangling. Scissors ripping apart everything she once touched and thought the basis of her world. Her hands are bleeding, scrambling to gather the pieces of what she'd thought would always remain true, catching on the sharp edges of this foreign land she's found. Nothing makes sense and her mind is white sheets.

“Why not?" he asks as if he hadn't broken _everything-everything-everything_. "No one'll know if I quit. No one'll care!”

“Chat,” she says with desperation, with fear, too loud and yet quiet and it takes everything in her not to scream, heart beating harder than anything else in her ears. She has to get away, get him away because-

But then her mouth is moving on their own accord, the words like the sweet toxins of the Miraculous Cure, an unknown’s blood bubbling in her veins. She feels like a bystander in her own body, her eyes the only windows to see the world but everything else was the master’s puppet to control. Her voice sounds strange, inhuman, inlaid in Tikki’s charming voice and completely overpowered by the Kwami. “As holder of the Ladybug Miraculous and the partner of the Cat Miraculous, in judgement of your words and your actions, I hereby revoke your rights to be Chat Noir.”

She steps out behind the wall, mechanical and practical, and it’s truly ironic cruelty when Adrien Agreste’s face unveils itself before her.

“What?” Adrien says in Chat Noir’s voice, disbelief and horror widening his foreign-familiar eyes.

Tikki is not human, is not kind when humans fail her, is not soft and indulgent of mercy for those undeserving. “You are not fit to be Chat Noir, Adrien Agreste.”

Adrien’s face is sunshine and beauty and so crystalline as his mouth opens and eyes widen in shock and terror. Ladybug aches for him, for the boy who had been her soulmate for two years.

But there’s no time for human relationships, not when she can still see the glister of water flooding the whole city, not when there’s a God speaking through her, so she turns to black, cat-shaped Kwami besides Adrien. The God stares at them with wide, feline eyes, green eyes ancient and old and edged so deeply in her borrowed blood, it feels familiar.

It is entirely Tikki when she says, “Plagg, it is your ultimate decision but I will never accept he who is so willing to forget his responsibilities.”

The Kwami looks around to Adrien. His cat-shaped eyes are the least human feature of his physical being but Ladybug is surprised to see them filled with such human feelings of pity.

“I’m…” he pauses and there’s two years in that pause, two years of partnership. Ladybug turns her eyes towards the sinking Paris. “I’m sorry, kid. I cared about you and no other Chat Noir will ever be you but Ladybug _ is _ right. You showed her and me that you'd willingly toss aside your role.”

“I-I didn’t really-”

“Yeah, you did, kid,” Plagg says, gently. “Let’s not fight, okay? Not on our last day.”

Adrien turns around to look at her open palm and then back at the resigned Kwami, eyes continually darting between them before he finally blinks very slowly and breaths in a sharp inhale.

“Oh,” he says and pulls off the ring.

Plagg disappears and Ladybug takes the Miraculous away, closing her eyes before she can fully look at Adrien Agreste’s heartbroken face. She’s glad there’s no fighting but, somehow, this quiet acceptance was even worse.

“You were a good partner, Chat Noir,” she says with her own words and whips away before he sees her choke back tears.

* * *

Defeating Syren is hard.

So, so hard because Ladybugs aren’t supposed to be on their own but Ladybug is smart, is beyond, and if Tikki’s control still lingers too strong in the back of her throat, she can only accept it as compensation for ripping her partner away. Miraculous was all about pairs, about two halves of a whole, and, even if it wasn't always evenly split between them, their duties and their power, there's still no one who can help set her up now.

When she does finally do it, when her mind finally finishes rewiring itself to settle on a single player plan of action with her Lucky Charm, she doesn’t delude herself and reach for an empty fist bump as the city is Cure’d.

There’d been times where she’s gone solo on Akuma and Chat Noir had not inexplicably appeared but this time is different. This time it’s permanent. There won’t be a sequel, a continuation to the story where Chat Noir in his blonde hair and green eyes popped up up with an apology and a kind smile.

Adrien Agreste was Chat Noir but she knows more than anyone how a person could be different in different masks, surrounded by different settings, with different _ bones _. Could be changed with the touch of a Kwami.

It's the only reason why this hurts more than Adrien Agreste, hurts more than even Chloé.

Adrien Agreste had been the crush of her life and Chloé had been the sun of her childhood but Chat Noir had been Ladybug’s partner, her other half, the spirit-touched boy who’d been made to fit her spirit-touched self. Two years, a couple months and hundreds of akumas and battles together. Blood thicker than water.

He’d never been her idea of a perfect partner. Too loud, too punny, too charming to be _ perfection _ but she'd loved him. He’d been the other in her duo and now it’s ended.

Before she swings to Master Fu to give him the Cat Miraculous and the numb report of what happened, to give away her best friend, she bows low to the city and quietly cries.

This is goodbye to Chat Noir.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Marinette can’t bring herself to move, can’t bring herself to make this new reality final. So her knees have been tucked under the table for the last few hours, restless hands tapping a chaotic rhythm against her strained thighs; Watching, with every tap, as the sun slowly crawled across the sky and hating every second of it. She’s already texted everyone she knows would care that she was busy and then thrown her phone away, into the depths of her bag. Silence.

Marinette can’t bring herself to move, can’t bring herself to make this new reality final. So her knees have been tucked under the table for the last few hours, restless hands tapping a chaotic rhythm against her strained thighs; Watching, with every tap, as the sun slowly crawled across the sky and hating every second of it. She’s already texted everyone she knows would care that she was busy and then thrown her phone away, into the depths of her bag. Silence.

“Tikki, Wayzz why don’t you two play next door? I have potion things to discuss with Marinette,” Master Fu says, disrupting the dripping quiet and throwing a stone into the flood Marinette has built up through the hours.

“Alright!” the two Kwamis say, cheerfully buzzing away.

Tikki turns around for a last look and smiles, large and wide. “Don’t take too long!”

They disappear and, despite his words, Master Fu does not continue any potions conversation.

“Marinette,” he says to her, thumbing the Turtle Miraculous with an unconsciousness she’s surprised still lingers in him. The Cat Miraculous has already been hidden from her sight, tucked away after her stone-cold explanation. He’s old, frighteningly forgetful, but he’s wise enough. Kind enough. Sometimes. It’s there, lingering at the corner of his eyes where he thinks the Gods can’t see it.

She thinks there’s human in him still and it’s enough for her care for him.

And, yet, she remains despondent, lethargic to respond because this might be real then. Cowardice bites her tongue and there is a shaking between her eyes. A motion sickness blurring her vision and a mountain binding her exhausted limbs. It has not stopped, won’t stop, cannot be stopped. It’s a chasm she’s falling into backwards since she’s ripped apart her partner with her own hands.

Glass the shade of his green eyes breaks itself over and over again in her head and her heart.

Trapped. She can’t see beyond the walls of Master Fu’s small apartment home, can’t feel the touch of Paris, can’t hear the life she wanted. She can’t even turn her head to his voice, staring into the abyss of her cold teacup. But, she listens anyways. Her role, her duty.

He must know because he continues despite her lacklustre response, “It is not my place to say and I probably should not open my mouth but I believe I must tell you now. Before you are swallowed whole by your misplaced guilt, please listen to this old man’s words. If not for the Guardian, then as a favour to Fu Wang.”

The softly-spoken plea is surprising but his tone is what catches her attention, makes her look at him as he spins out his memories. She’d thought he’d wanted this, wanted a lacking Chat Noir gone instead of fixed, but he sounds like quiet candle in an empty field. Like the cut of black, stiff jackets. The stretch of muddy formal shoes digging into a crying earth.

A pity he had said and she had been sharpened by his cold words. But maybe he’d simply been resigned to Chat Noir’s fate, sharp and mercurial in his foresight. She wonders ‘how many had passed in his care?’ and knows the answer. Enough goodbyes to fill this empty house.

It doesn’t matter. The void in her chest clings to an empty future.

“Before I had given the Miraculouses, it was my duty to test you two,” he explains, softly like a hushed tale. “It had been destiny, Marinette, for you to be Chosen; it _ is _ in your blood, your timeline, to hold the Ladybug Miraculous. You can already sense it too; it’s the hymn in your soul when you’re next to people you can Choose. But destiny is a funny thing because, even when you _ are _ fated, that does not mean _ then _ was _ your _ time.”

Her doubts of being Miraculous User, of her role, fizzles out into a blossom of scattered thoughts. Any other time and she’d be bursting open into a forest fire of burning questions, a million and million more enquiries and ideas.

Any strength to even handle a single question fizzles like a dying ember.

He waits for her to comment, an opening silence turned awkward quiet as the seconds drag on. She doesn’t refuse to speak, simply can’t find the will to. So when she remains mute even a minute after, he pauses for a brief second before he continues his tale and she listens with tired ears.

“So, I tested you. And I could have done anything, anything at all to see that your then character had been matured enough for the role. I could have tested your intelligence, your wit, or your strategic planning. Everything in the old ways would have pushed for that. But, instead, I tested your kindness, your willingness to help, and I believe I have still chosen right for you.”

“Why are you telling me this?” she asks, finally, feeling a thousand little bells in her head ring at once, the noise almost unbearable. The words are like an afterthought, a mirage she’s surprised is real. She’s exhausted.

“Because while I still believe innovation is a matter of course, it does not mean the old ways were _ wrong _,” he says and there’s regret in the corner of the eyes he turns to her. Regret and guilt and so many emotions he’s learnt to edge just low enough, curb just so. It’s probably the only way he can still handle Guardianship without shaking hands.

He tells her, “For you, I was fortunate. With a little confidence, with a little push, you were already fit for the duties, for the responsibility. You had the characteristics of a superhero I _ should _ have also looked for. I was fortunate with you.”

A flickering flame and only the mourning lilies to accompany it. A shade of familiar green in the distance and he looks away. “I was not fortunate with Chat Noir and it is another of my failure. He is as you are, destined for the Cat Miraculous but if his time to be Chosen was then or another was up to the Guardian, to _ me _, to judge. He was not ready, not completely, and yet I had still burdened him because I believed he will evolve, will grow to be right. It is one more to my failures. But, more than that, I should have made sure your progress had been monitored and enforced by your Kwamis if not myself. My complacency has cost you and him.

“So,” he says and moves to sit by her side. He bows his head to the ground, old joints creaking as he lowers himself completely to the floor, hands grappling the earth and neck bared for her shocked eyes. A bow so low only Emperors had been rewarded them. “So, please forgive my incompetence and rest this failure rest on me.”

She recoils from him and where once would have laid pity is instead consumed by a _ burning _. Her heart flashes in a dangerous, simmering anger. Swift and biting fast. Brutality sings in her human blood. A bite of acid claws its way to the top of her throat.

“It’s your fault,” she says and Master Fu flinches, head still pressed to the floor. She doesn’t even know how she could even speak. A dozen needles whole were swallowed in her lungs. And yet, she surges forward, consumed by the hot forest fire in her veins, in her nerves, in her tongue. Louder. Harder. Burning. “It’s your fault, it’s your fault, _ it’s all your fault _!”

Practically screaming, she stands up and rages on and on, everything she’s kept locked up, everything she’s never spoken, bubbling up into her shrill voice. But there’s no joy in it, no satisfaction to see Master Fu’s hunched back. Just a mindless ** _hate-hate-hate_ **.

She keeps repeating her memories, playing them out again and again in her mind’s drawing board. It’s stuck on loop and she can’t stop stitching out his blonde hair and green eyes. They’re melded beautifully into the sunlight that’s always behind him in these visions. She doesn’t think of forced candles or hand kisses. The pettiness she knows is a part of him as much as his charm. She doesn’t want to remember those as him, not entirely. He’s puns and laughter. The reassurance of being there at least next time. Hero of Paris.

Chat Noir.

Her former partner.

With a choked back breath, she slides down onto the floor and cradles herself in her arms.

“It’s not your fault,” she croaks out, voice broken. She hadn’t realised she was crying until the fat, wet tears flow down her face and splashes onto her clenched fists. She sniffles and snot drips down anyways. She tries to wipe away her tears and cries into the comfort of her trembling hands anyways. “It’s- It’s my fault. He was my partner.”

“No, Marinette, this failure is not yours,” Master Fu’s voice says, so weary, so old, so resigned. He shuffles and places a single, gentle hand on her shoulder. “Don’t blame yourself, child.”

“Can’t we give him another chance?” she asks, _ begs _ because she can’t pray, clutching at his shirt with a painful desperation. Why didn’t she think about this earlier? There must be a way to fix things. Surely. She’s Ladybug, she’s Marinette, she can _ fix _ things. Isn’t that who she is? “We- We can teach him! To be better! You said it was his destiny. Surely that means something? Anything, _ anything _ . _ Please. _”

He takes her hands off his shirt and uncurls her fingers from the bloody crescents she’s engraved into her palms. Wrinkled hands, wax-like but with calluses like hard scales. Warmth in his eyes. Warmth in his stifled regret.

“I’m sorry- I’m so sorry, my dear,” he says and breaks her heart with every word. “Tikki and Plagg have already spoken. By their words, Adrien Agreste has been revoked his rights to Chat Noir. There is nothing we can do.” He closes his eyes and the hope in hers. “We both know...”

He drops his head, words trailing because Wayzz and Tikki are ‘playing’ in the room next door, and wretches the sobs from her breath.

_ They are not kind _.

* * *

It hurts everything in her soul to step outside and confront the new world but this is something she must. It’s still an hour before dusk and the world feels wholly raw and on the edge of change. The pale disc of the sun melts low on the skyline and the shadows settles around the cut out of Chat Noir.

* * *

She can’t eat, can barely sleep.

Her parents stare at her with worry. They can already connect the red puffiness under her eye bags and the slight glaze around her irises but she shuts the trapdoor before they could talk to her. They will talk to her later, she knows but for now they will respect her boundaries.

Tikki nuzzles her sweetly and curls around her face.

“It’ll be alright, Marinette!” she says, ancient and beaming. “This will be _ perfect _ and balance will be restored much easier and sooner. Believe me, Hawk Moth will be defeated.”

The smile she pulls on feels like threads barely hanging on but she does it anyway because she must. “As you say, Tikki.”

* * *

The new dawn comes slowly and Marinette watches it with tired acceptance as it creeps into daylight.

At four in the morning and with the knowledge she couldn’t sleep anymore, she sneaks away into the streets to wander around. Her parents will be worried, will admonish her later when they don't see her in bed, but not even the open balcony is enough for her restless nerves.

Step by step into the grey world of before dawn.

There’s no real destination in mind and her feet simply moves on their own. They take her through parks and familiar places but she can’t appreciate the view.

The wind rustles. Hush.

Eventually, she hears water and shivers as the temperature cools.

Bit by bit, the Seine comes into vision.

It’s cold, freezing even, and her breath splays out into tiny crystals in front of her face but she can barely feel it.

The emptiness tastes sharp on her tongue and grief couples itself with the bitter air in her lungs.

“Marinette?” a voice calls out to her, echoing off the empty streets until it becomes the only sound she can hear.

“Luka?” she asks and stares.

Luka is bright blue and black, dressed up in winter clothing and an extra dark Jagged Stone sweater underneath his blue jumper. The guitar bag strapped to his back is a given and the only surprise is his empty hands.

He looks both ways before crossing the street even though there’s definitely no one except workers even awake enough to drive this early. He’s always been careful though. It’s one of his most endearing traits.

“Hey,” he says when he reaches her side, pressing a kiss to her cheek she returns with fatigued energy. His lips are ice cold and she wonders how long he’s been walking around. Probably since last night by the look of his eye bags. The walk hasn't done him any good though, he looks even more tired than she feels. He usually does but it’s always been hidden behind the careful look of calm he’s perfected for his anxious little sister. But being four in the morning undoes many things.

“Insomnia, again?” she asks and he nods with a weary smile. A quiet acceptance in him despite the unfairness of his suffering.

They start walking down along the riverside and the crisp air feels a little less like dread and pain. It’s not entirely gone but it helps.

“What are you doing up and out?” he asks five steps in, fingers on his guitar bag.

“I couldn’t sleep,” she says simply.

He doesn’t even blink and says, “Want to talk about it?” He shrugs his acoustic guitar out with practice. “Or do you just want me to play for you?”

It’s always his easy acceptance that lets her breathe. It’s his calm and care.

“Both, please,” she says and he nods.

He plays the song she’s been labelling as his comfort song. It’s soft and easy on the ears with nothing too crazy about it except that it undoes every tension in her worn body note by note. Something warm and yellow. Like the taste of a fresh croissant and warm milk.

“It’s one of my best friends,” she says and he doesn’t say anything except continue playing. People are starting to wake up and get out, there’s almost a person every few metres now. They have to walk around a couple 'coupling' on the side of the street. A few heads turn to his guitar playing but they're unbothered by anyone. “It’s not Alya; none of you guys have ever really met him. But yesterday, he made a mistake. It... was pretty big, almost unforgivable, and my other friends got really mad at him. I get it, he really messed up and that's pretty understandable. Except-” she bites her lip, “Except I thought we were going to talk about it, let him learn from it, not- not what they decided to do. I- there’s nothing I can do to get them to make up again and basically I have to say goodbye forever to him.”

He continues playing, ending the song on a light major chord before he speaks, “Well, your other friends aren’t going to talk to him but why don’t you go talk to him? What's stopping Marinette Dupain-Cheng on fixing this injustice?”

“I-”

She stares as the rays of sunlight whites out the windows and glass of storefronts and her eyes catch onto a billboard, matte in the distance. The spirit blood in her roars a deafening screech.

She knows what she has to do. Will do. Always.

“Sorry, I have to go!”

Luka grins at her. “Then run!”

She closes in on him, pulls him down to kiss his cheek and promises him, “Let’s go out tomorrow.”

He curls his hand along her cheek and smiles before he spins her around and pushes her forward.

And then she runs.

Sprinting down the street, she’s so glad it’s so early in the morning to watch as she scrambles ungracefully. There’s nothing Ladybug and swinging beauty in her mad dash as she leaps forward and staggers along almost blindly.

Past the shimmering buildings, along the golden footwalk, street by street blurs from one to the other.

Paris becomes a map and she threads her path towards the X she’s circling over.

There’s a glittering blonde and white in the corner of her vision and she’s almost tempted to ignore it but wrenches around to stare at the last second. 

Despite every expectation, he’s standing in the middle of a random park and it’s truly a coincidence that she had seen him there. The children have long since left, only a distant memory of laughter, and there’s no other soul beside his stock still form. He stares at the empty swing set as if it could tell him life’s answers. The cover of loneliness.

She hadn’t expected to see him until another kilometre of running.

“Adrien!” she calls out and he turns towards her with blank green eyes. A wave of guilt floods her eyes because she did this to him.

“Marinette?” he says, confused. “What are you doing here?”

She runs up to him and stumbles to stop, hands on her knees as she inhales and exhales too loudly.

“Adrien,” she chokes and tries to catch her breath at the same time. She will regret this, she will regret this when Tikki smile at her later, but not anymore than she would have if she didn’t do this now. “Adrien, why did you have the Miraculous Grimoire?”

And he stares at her with eyes that spark back into life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay so like angst is literally my lifeblood but I understand this isn't really salty? like not typical salt with vindictiveness.
> 
> I dunno, Adrien screwed up at this point but it isn't the level bullshit of that was the later half of the show. He hasn't completely devolved into a nice guy in this fic, I promise! So I'm giving him a sweeter ending because he's still a kid who did could be built up for second chances and I just really want Marinette to be screw you to god's plans.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “How do you know about the book?” he asks immediately, brows furrowed and crease as light as falling meteors.
> 
> And, like the scarf, of course Gabriel had even taken this from her.

“How do you know about the book?” he asks immediately, brows furrowed and crease as light as falling meteors.

And, like the scarf, of course Gabriel had even taken this from her.

The sky turns a deep pink curled around the edges of dusk blue and washed-out purple. The Earth feels heavy and molten cold and an extension of her very soul, a weight hung so low her back bends with it. It feels so lonely, spinning, spinning, spinning through an ever expanding universe. She can hear stars die alone.

“Because I used the potions written in them,” Marinette says and there’s no going back from this, the words are out and they will damn her. Crisp air tangles through her gilded lungs. “And I know who your father is- really is.”

"What- How do you know about-" he splutters before stopping. His body frozen like pulled strings ready to snap and a hand too willing to break them.

He blinks once, slow and curling and she holds her breath stiff in her crowded chest. It stays solid and smothering, rattling along right next to her pounding heart.

A pause between her pulse and she inexplicably remembers the piles of one-sided love letters she'd written through quatrième, right after Ladybug had made her despairing debut. She'd specifically picked these pale pink paper with pale flower accents and filled them with thirteen year old Marinette's fantasies, carefully folding them into pristine white envelopes with no postcodes on the back. Everyday without fail, she'd write one or two sentence and put them into her music box until there weren't anymore fantasies left to escape to and she stopped. Now, they'd been scrunched up and burned away a long time ago, wispy grey smoke trailing after into the clouds to say goodbye. For some reason, she can't help but imagine smoke gathering around her now, dense and dark, almost black. Could almost smell the scent of pale flowers. Sightless as the world spins underneath their feet and stars die with no one beside them.

He stares at her with wide green mirrors and she can see herself, small and polkadot large, in them.

Classmate, friend, earrings.

It's easy-to-see pattern once God leaves their sides and an easier time to connect the dots.

The luminescence of a cat’s eye glows with a keen intelligence, unnervingly bright. Pink lips part. Within the depths of his mind, a crackling fire starts burning, sending smoke signals.

Pigtails, earrings, pigtails, earrings.

She can see Adrien in the spring dawn of his green-green eyes as they widen with a crinkle of ideas and lines, in the maths and the equations he so loves. But it’s also Chat Noir, her partner, in the morning simmer of thoughts and memories, the quick wit of darting around, as they play out on his secret drafting board.

Ah.

She knows him, this person; her friend; her partner; and two turns into this one.

So it’s both when ChatNoirAdrien narrows his eyes and turns them towards her with _ knowing _like the blade of cut grass.

"Are you- mmPH!"

She clamps her hands over his mouth, breath harsh, desperation harsher. The world spins underneath her feet and she can hear suns screaming. The vacuum of space breathes into her hollow ears and it sounds like earrings humming.

"Don't."

It shouldn't mean much, not really, not entirely. It's all in her head but she can't help feeling the boiling sand forming around her. Strangling vines crawling into her kneecaps as his lips caress those forbidden words. She knows he knows. The doubts and the thoughts are all but confirmed but words are _ power _. Maybe, just a little, just enough. Her hands grasp onto the power and onto the technicalities and it slices through her fingers.

His voice is muffled. "Don't?"

She nods sharply. "Don't." Then softens her tone because he's Chat Noir, he's Adrien. Because she's Ladybug, she's Marinette. Two into one. "Please."

It might be pointless, might all be for nothing. Maybe the sands already up to the edges of her ears, swallowing her whole in its tight line of muscle and teeth and deep, deep laughter but her eyes are still looking upwards towards a hope-filled star that's already long since collapsed. But she's grown up with Faerie rules and Faerie promises whispered to her under bedtime darkness, not Kwamis and their large human-like eyes and yin-yang balance. Her hands might just be grasping onto a barbwire net, sweat dripping red between her fingers as pinprick pain bites into her hopes and dreams. But the world spins underneath her feet and she has to.

Chat Noir hasn’t always been kind, hasn’t always been quick with the rules and even less with the secrets.

But he'd been her soulmate.

He gasps a breath, tears gathering at the corners and finger achingly bare. Closes his eyes as she takes her hand away because she knows his answer before he opens his mouth.

“Thank you,” she says.

“Yea-” A sharp inhale as green eyes glistens- “Yeah. Of course and-and I’ll tell you everything. I promise.”

She looks at him and sees his mother’s blonde hair, pink heart-shaped lips and bright green eyes. It’s all the surface stuff she’s fawned over for a year, all the supermodel looks and superficiality magazines pushed for. All the grace of a beloved mother. Wind curls his fringe across his eyes and, this time, she looks deeper and sees his father in the curve of his eyes, the perk of his nose and the edges of his cheekbones. Looks even further and sees the careful hairstyle to bring out his features, the always perfectly styled clothes from Gabriel Agreste’s _ Son _ fashion line, and the trim nails on fingers perfect for piano.

One of the worst fathers she had never known. A supervillain. A despicable bourgeoisie. Man so cold-hearted he'd neglected his own son. _ Scum _.

She looks at Adrien and knows this will be one of the worst things she could have ever done to do to him.

Slowly, silently, softly, she reaches forward and grabs hold of his warm hands, burning in the cold. (Something that would have sent her to space a few months ago; who'd have known it'd only take heartbreak for her.) She traces her hand along his and holds on as tight as she could. They’re cream soft, no rough calluses thick on delicate fingertips even with piano and fencing and rock climbing. Even prettier than prince’s hands and it breaks her heart. She squeezes as hard as she could before letting go. “Thank you.”

He shakes his head and looks to the pure blue sky, the sun’s fully up and sunlight crests the tips of his hair into gold. Harsh jagged lines so fragile without steel.

“I should have said it a long time ago. I should have been a better-” he cuts himself off, a practiced motion like something he’s learnt in fencing, and turns to her with a bitter smile, “I should have been better. For you and our friends and... For Paris.”

Regret builds in her heart as sunlight hits his cheeks, cuts them into a sharper edge, and for a brief, stupid moment, she swore she could see what he’d look like ten years in the future. Maybe a different hair style, a little more definition to his nose, his jaw's finally trimming up and he's older, awkward mix between teen and adult. The same green eyes and pink lips. A perfect blend of his missing mom and supervillain dad.

The Earth moves on and stars die. So she closes her eyes even though her heart is full.

For Paris.

* * *

From outside the park’s entrance, Luka looks up at them, face set into a carefully oblivious smile. It’s entirely sincere, she knows. He’s sweet enough to have not eavesdropped; practiced enough to know when to sit on the edges; straightforward enough to wait for Marinette to tell him. Patient and cool as a stream waiting to reach the ocean.

“C’mon,” he says because he must have heard something in their heartsongs and his hands are gentle. “The Liberty’s empty until Jules gets home.”

* * *

It’s a purposefully mindless silence between the three of them as they walk.

Luka spins his ring, again and again; barely a noise; barely an expression in his peaceful eyes. She catches his thumb sliding against metal, slow and controlled. Silence, he’s taught her, was sometimes more meaningful than noise. A thousand meanings in a picture, a million in quiet.

For his part, Adrien can look awkward, can exude cluelessness, duck-drien in desperate need for mother-duckino, but it had never broken his steady walk. Step after step like every road was filled with blinding cameras and faceless expectations. So while he had a strange aura of uncomfort and a strained pattern of unease, he never tripped over himself in his perfect strides and continuously looked forward. She imagined a soldier braced for suicide and turns her head away.

A breeze settles with morning air and it’s filled with mutual tension.

Eventually, The Liberty comes into view, bright and vibrant, a flash of colour in cold daylight.

Marinette takes a breath the moment land turns into a sway of a river and it tastes a little like coming home. She has many different homes, collected through the years as she grew up and held onto hands with people; Chloé’s big and empty mansion had been her first home away from home once upon a time; Alya’s apartment of tiny siblings and bedroom of books and reports still opened its arms and embraced her every time she visited. They each held a special feel, like the same fabric stitched into different styles. The Bakery was Warmth and her apartment was Safety. Now with every subsequent visit, The Liberty has slowly started to become Calm. They’re all little bells of happiness she’s threaded into her soul, ringing every time she needed a place to hold her.

Her shoulders relax, the knot in her spine uncurls, and she leads them up onto the cluttered deck and into the equally cluttered greenhouse. Gratitudes completes her and she's grateful The Liberty existed; grateful to have a place here. She glances up and doesn’t have to say a word to see Luka’s smile curl gentle and soft.

Luka uses his thumb to point up and then down before looking at her with a raised eyebrow.

The living room was tempting warm with an easy access to the kitchen and ice-cream.

She deliberates.

A pigeon hoots. She looks upwards. The sun catches the light of glass and a thousand sparkles come to life. Luka had forgotten to turn off the fairy lights again. Looks like Feu the Frêne (Fire the Ash Tree) got four new bird friends and those droppings will have to be cleaned up later. Juleka’s Swordopus (Sword+Octopus) casts a purplish tinge to her skin, the light shines in the distance. Comfort sinks and nudges against her ankles with soft fur.

She glances at Adrien and nods her head to the Greenhouse’s seating area. Luka gives her two thumbs-up which quickly turns into finger-guns and a cheesy grin- corny. She rolls her eyes at them and, like always, her exasperation apparently cracks him up like no tomorrow.

Pulling off the protective cloth and tucking it under the messy coffee table, she slides onto the single seater and watches the other two. Adrien awkwardly copies her actions with the other seater, wrangling the edges and looking like a rumpled baby kitten, until Luka takes pity on him. He takes over and grabs the sheets with black nails. A quiet thanks as soft as a music note and he folds them both in a practiced flourish before stacking atop hers, neat and pristine. He'd filled in a part-time housekeeper or something as a favour to a friend.

Dropping his guitar onto the ground, Luka relaxes back onto the couch and spreads his legs underneath hers because he likes to show off his growth spurts. Adrien remains standing in front of them, body posture twisted awkwardly both like silk pulled to tight. Smiling, Luka pats the spot next to him, the gesture sweet and familiar, and something warm fills her when she remembers when he'd done that for her too.

Slowly, Adrien sits down on the edge of the long couch, furthest from her, nimbly like a newborn learning to crawl.

And like a particularly curious newborn, his eyes hesitantly rove around the greenhouse, catching onto everything from the Juleka’s polaroids to the random CDs littered about even though the better stereo was downstairs to the millions of potted plants and cacti. She spots five new ferns guarding Feu’s base and swears these plants were multiplying every time she visited. He particularly traces over Juleka's Swordopus, the First Mate JellyMate, and SkullWingZ.

Finally, his eyes settle back on her.

“Ah-” Adrien starts and then darts a glance at Luka, biting his lips.

“I’ll get some breakfast,” Luka says and gets up.

Marinette grabs onto the edges of his jacket and stares at lips spread into a smile, deep and sincere, before retrieving her hand.

"Tea too," she says, trying her best to sound natural and knowing she's fooling no one.

He laughs with his belly, pretty notes tinkling through the air like bubbles tucked gently against her palms. "Of course."

Luka pats her head and does the same to a surprised Adrien before disappearing into the next room and downstairs out of sight.

Adrien rubs at his head, hand chasing after the feeling of an older brother's easy affection, and stares after him. "He's nice."

She agrees and heavy silence surrounds the void around them, neither daring to broach the topic of Kwamis and betrayals.

"Adrien," she says and stops, doesn’t know what to say so just trails off her words into the pit between them.

“My father is Hawk Moth.”

He smiles at her, picture perfect and teeth straight; gleaming. Finally, she knows even if he'd been too early for Chat Noir, he'd still been the perfect partner for her Ladybug. That smile felt too familiar on her own lips after all.

* * *

Adrien Agreste flips through the secret photos he'd taken of his father's mysterious book and thinks, thinks, thinks.

He's a smart boy. At least that's what his tutors say, his grades say, Nathalie says and never ever his father.

There's a glaring equation biting at his heels and he's always loved maths.

"What do you think it means Plagg?"

Plagg boredly sits beside him, curled around a cube of camembert and doesn't reply. That’s fine; Adrien hadn't really expected an answer, this was probably a mission for him to uncover by himself. Or maybe Plagg was just lazy. The kwami was sometimes as leisurely as a real cat and Adrien kind of wants to scratch his itty bitty head but doesn't. It'd probably be too rude; Plagg wasn't real cat after all. He shouldn't treat his friend like that.

Another image. The Butterfly symbol and pure white glow etched in gold and he dissects it carefully, wondering if Hawk Moth looked like this too. He moves forward quickly and scans each page. Older Chat Noirs appear sporadically and he fixates on every flash of Ladybug red. Sighing, he caresses the image of a masked woman in polka-dotted kimono and wonders about his Lady Love. Her beautiful eyes come into mind and he cradles the tablet to his chest, a fluttering wind through his heart. He wonders what she could be doing, where she could be, what'd she think if she ever found out…

Heart sinking and it brushes like cold days waiting at the door, listening for anyone on the other side. 

He flips to the next page pauses on the photo of his mother framed in simple black and lovely. He hasn't seen a physical photo of her in so long. Immediately after she had disappeared (and his heart still pangs and calls out to a blonde woman who always smiled), there’d been so many things happening but Adrien remembers how his father had taken every photo album they had and locked it up in his office, not a word to Adrien who’d watched from down the hallway. Nowadays, he had to rely on the few digital ones he had of her and the weird gaudy painting father kept in the atelier. But Adrien didn't really like going in there, it was a bit embarrassing to see his father's tiny affections and strange expression of pride.

The feathery brooch and the Tibet stuff, he didn't really understand. He'd never seen his mother wear something like that, never even seen the design in any of his father's works and mother always wore father's works. The book shows all the Miraculous users through history, all of them. He worries his lip between his teeth but Plagg doesn't say anything. And, in all his time growing up in Agreste Mansion, he'd never seen his parents to travel for fun, he'd only ever known his parents to travel for work and serious business.

There's so many secrets inlaid here in his cold, cold home they form mazes within mazes, stairs from upside down and portals through portraits. So many secrets and they only needed the right questions to solve the equation.

Adrien's a smart boy.

* * *

"I'd suspected- no, I'd known," he says after telling her everything about the vault and secrets of a painting, sunlit smile slipping off with the gentleness of an eclipse and everything between them collapsing into the realm of the cold and dark and mute. No words could have ever been as tragic as when he fluttered eyelashes close and said, “I’d known all along who he was.”

“I’m sorry for who he was to you,” is all she can say, balloon large and broken in her throat, and it’ll never be enough.

“Don’t apologise, _please_. I-I was also wrong here, after all.” He shakes his head and pushes her sympathy away with a lingering caress. “I knew who he was. I knew he was- he was a _terrorist_; that he _hurt_ people. I’d seen everything he’d done to u-us, to all our-” he brings a hand to cover his eyes and shudders, “to all our _friends_ and the innocents of Paris, and yet- and yet I still decided to prioritise _myself_,” he spits his words out with the gesture of a self-loathing hand plunging into his own chest, fingers curled around a missing cataclysm. “I deluded myself into thinking I was just giving him a chance to repent, that, maybe, one day he’ll finally realise what he was doing was _crazy_ and stop on his own; I just needed to give him time. He wouldn’t destroy _our_ future just for a folly chance of Mother returning, right? He loved me enough, right? I needed to give him this, he’ll come to eventually.”

He shakes his head, self-disgust imminent, and she doesn’t dare note how he roughly scrubbed away raindrops slipping free from his purpling eyes.

“I wasn’t giving him a ‘_ chance _ ’ or whatever; I _ never even confronted him _ ! How could I have ever even began my farce of a redemption when he didn’t even _ know _ ? I was a **coward** , running away from the joke that’s my family.” He strangles words through bared teeth and eyes filled light with the burning of fourteen years of emotions, “My mother wasn’t a pillar of light and gentleness, no matter how much I _ wished _ she was. She was just as bad as my father, just as enormed in him than in caring for me, just as controlling and possessive in maintaining the perfect little son, but, at least, she always had a smile on; at least I knew she cared enough... My father-” he sobs, fat tears rolling down rounded cheeks of a fourteen year old boy and anger dissipates out of him, drained into a goblet of melancholy, “my father _ is _ Hawk Moth, he’s a terrible person and he had never _ loved me enough _.”

The conviction of a guilty man and it bends his spine down, hunches his shoulder forward and twists his neck into a lowered line.

She reaches out because she’s Ladybug, hero of Paris, protector of all; because she’s Marinette, once bullied and no more, defender of her beloved friends, of herself; because she’s someone who cares for this lonely boy in front of her. Because, even if he had taken their trust and misused his silence, he was still her friend, her partner, someone precious to her heart. Her heart is bending and it feels like a mixture of heartbreak and love.

She takes her hand and places it between his shoulder blades and presses down hard.

“Let’s go find our friends.”

_ I’m here _ , that hand says, _ and everyone who loves you are too._

* * *

After breakfast, after Luka stared between the two with concern and gave them extra scoops of ice-cream, they settle their tea and look at each other.

"Are you sure?" she can't help but ask.

He wipes his tear stains and nods, green eyes striking with conviction. “Come on. We'll need an army.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> im so s o r r y this took so long
> 
> final assessment period killed me and this chapter was so hard to write.
> 
> I'm ending here cause reasons
> 
> Thanks so much for reading <3 Much love to everyone who commented and kudo'd!! During the hellfire that juggling an expo, four essays and preping for my exam, I felt so much just opening my gmail and seeing notifications of your support <3<3<3


	4. Leaving ML

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hey, this is the author of ‘music threads her heart close’ and I just wanted to say that I’m no longer updating the series nor writing for the Miraculous Ladybug in general. Mostly because the source material is no longer fun to watch and consume but also due to some unsavoury interactions in the fandom. I write fanfic for fun and personal enjoyment and I don’t feel any more passion and love for this once beloved medium.
> 
> I apologies for cancelling just before the climax and resolution in the ‘music threads’ but I honestly can’t summon any motivation to write anymore.
> 
> As a parting gift, here’s the Lukanette confession scene and ending I was writing towards:

She’s not a compass and he’s not a statue, no. They’re two magnets circling around each other for the last two years and she can finally, finally, choose.

“You’re a pattern I see every time I close my eyes. A perfectly stitched pull between you and me,” she says, a little breathless, but she doesn’t stop, can’t stop. There is only this moment, right now, right here, with this boy who sends her heart soaring. If she stops, she will never get these words out ever again. Not these ones at least. “You’re a thread and needle and the steady pull as you embroider your song into my heart.”

“Marinette,” he says her name like it was the stars in the skies and he’s written himself into her constellations. He’s breathless, too, and the song of their breathing and beating heart fills her ears like liberation. His cheeks dust bright pink and his eyes can’t leave hers, a magnetic bind of the ocean mirroring the sky. It’s only fair, her eyes can’t leave his either.

She clutches at his hands, squeezes tighter. “I have destiny lined at my fingertips and I can only see you in it.”

“I love you,” she says.

And he replies, easy as breathing, “I love you, too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who read, kudo’d, subbed, bookmarked, commented and loved my work. Thank you for being there <3

**Author's Note:**

> "ml: when i said canon divergence i really meant canon divergence"


End file.
